Canine Devotion, The Dog And Pony Show Remix
by Kay Seda
Summary: Cain finds life a shapeshifter to be complicated, especially while his owner is an eccentric genius with a price on his head.


**Title:** Canine Devotion (The Dog And Pony Show Remix)  
**Author:** Kay Seda  
**Summary:** "There is no faith which has never yet been broken, except that of a truly faithful dog." - Konrad Lorenz (1903–1989) Austrian zoologist and ethologist  
**Rating:** PG  
**Warnings:** *checks the original* "It's not bestiality. Really." still applies.  
**Author's Note:** Written for the first _Tin _Man fic remix challenge, the original story was "Glitch's Dog Is Only Part-Time (But He's Always, _Always_ Glitch's)" by luchia13 on LJ. In this universe Cain is a shapeshifter like Toto (but then so's just about everyone, whether they know it or not), only he turns into a great big golden retriever.

* * *

"She's a vixen," one of his classmates had told him the night he met Adora.

Cain shook his head. "She's a lady, no two ways about it."

Later, when he considered her stealth, the way she'd grinned, her cleverness and grace, he decided that maybe she was part fox all along. Even later than that, he wondered if she'd known it about herself. As he ran through a universe of sound and smell, his son bounding at his side, hoof beats thundering behind and joy filling his heart, he hoped she had.

*

Four annuals was a long, long time to spend on four feet. He'd spent the first two beyond lost, the jaws of his memory locked on what had been done to him. It was barely enough to keep him sane but plenty to keep him alive, the drive for revenge pushing him onward until the chance was snatched away from him.

For a moment he was a man again, full of will and rage but confusion won out and they took him down easily.

Cain knew nothing for a while except that he was back in a monochrome world. When he could focus again he found himself looking up at the worried face of a man who was promising to take care of him. He would have argued if he were in any position to do so, but he was too weak, too hurt, and the man had a soothing voice and his hands were gentle as they stroked Cain's neck and ears. Cain accepted the comfort with a whuffling sigh and the faintest wag of his tail.

*

Thus he became Glitch's dog, or Glitch became his human, it was a difficult distinction. The understanding that they were partners had come quickly, and as far as Cain was concerned this made them pack. He would defend Glitch to his last breath, and he instinctively knew that the man would do the same for him.

He learned Glitch's scent (ink and paper, secrets and straw) and learned to track him as he trotted through the Realm of the Unwanted. Cain accepted the collar, the tag, the squeaky toys, the constant moving, the assassination attempts, it would all be fine so long as he could stay with Glitch.

They shared a bed for warmth, and Cain would try to guard against the nightmares that made Glitch's heart race like a charger leaping into battle. He would wake from his own dreams with a growl or a whimper to reassuring shushing and fingers gliding through his fur.

It was a good life, or as good as any life could be when it was being eked out while one was living in the Realm under near-constant threat of being killed, knowing that the world above was suffering under the rule of an insane tyrant. Cain's thoughts would turn to his unfinished business, his wife's cries echoing in his mind as he gazed up to the murky roof with its dim bulbs. He had to get out before he lost any chance to taste the blood of those who had destroyed his family, but he could not leave without Glitch, and Glitch would not leave the sanctuary of the Realm's bedlam unless he thought he had to.

On one of Toto's visits to exchange information, Cain had asked him in the silent communication of Shifters why they didn't just tell him the whole story. The smaller dog had glanced over to Glitch (who was hunched over the table, scribbling notes and muttering in that jaffa-neez language of his) then blurred, and became a man. He'd bent down and sadly petted Cain's head.

"He's got enough on his mind," Tutor said quietly. "He can't run the Resistance and sort out your problems too, you'll have to work it out on your own."

"What are you telling my dog?" Glitch called absently.

Tutor had grinned and straightened. "Dog stuff, you wouldn't understand," he replied, and Glitch responded with a lip-flapping sigh. The new plans were handed over, Tutor became Toto again, and Cain glared after him as he left the apartment.

It would be many months before they saw him again.

*

The first time he saw Glitch with his other eyes, Cain thought the man looked like a spooked colt: he'd reared back in shock, nostrils flaring, brown eyes gone wide and wild.

"Ever think I was such a bad dog because I'm not one?"

Also very much like a spooked colt he then caused some grievous harm that was not really his fault. Glitch was clearly on autopilot when he shot their would-be assassin out the window, he didn't _mean_ to do it, in fact it barely registered. This should have worried Cain, but after two annuals of living with Glitch he was more than prepared to accept it. He also accepted a pair of pants, and the gun, and the fact that for the first time in a painfully long while he was walking on two legs instead of four.

To his dismay Cain realized that, despite having his clothes and his hat and his _human-ness_ back he had forgotten a lot of what being human _meant_, the norms and the niceties. As soon as he remembered speech he forgot tact, and there were a lot of non sequitors followed by awkward silences. He'd also forgotten things like boundaries and personal space, he'd become more tactile.

Glitch, unused to human company, was of little help. It was to the point where Cain found himself telling his story while nearly curled up in Glitch's lap and neither of them thinking anything of it. It all came out, the longcoats, what happened to his wife and son, how he only seemed able to shift when he _had_ to (and he felt himself waver, sound giving flavor and smells colors for a fraction of an instant before it was gone again). They talked about how long Tutor had been away, and how long Glitch had been living underground, and Cain made that part of his mission, to get Glitch into the sunslight.

*

When they did emerge from the Realm Cain wanted him to _run_, to spin and kick up his heels in the tall grass, to become what Cain knew he could be. Instead Glitch collapsed, foal-weak, under the onslaught of sky. It was all right, though, it was just new and big and Cain knew it was going to take time that they maybe didn't have in that moment, hunting and tracking things and it would be so much simpler if he could only-

Suddenly, without thinking of it, he shifted. He wagged his tail, caught countless scents on the wind including the handful he truly needed, and took off through the grass with Glitch loping after him.

*

As it turned out they did have some time. Time for them to find the Resistance, and Jeb (who was alive and whole and sly and loyal all at once), and for Cain to figure out how to shift when he wanted to and not just when he _had_ to. There was also time enough to watch Glitch go through his paces in assembling a plan that would carry them through to the Eclipse and maybe beyond.

Time, too, for Cain to hold on to Glitch and relearn his scent and pulse, to become certain of his heart, to put into words two annuals worth of protection and faith and finally call it love.

*

There was a girl with eyes as wide and blue as autumn sky, a Viewer who forged bravery from kindness, and together they reduced the Sorceress' bleak winter to a robin's promised spring. Only then, when the realm was safe and his mission complete, did Glitch Snap.

One moment he was gawping up at the sky, then there was a blurring and shifting and in his place was a massive dark-brown stallion, all power and grace and pride and everything Cain had been glimpsing out of the corner of his eye.

"Glitch is a _horse_," DG said before turning her ire to Raw. "What are you going to turn into, a parrot?"


End file.
